[tweetmeme]Promotional clip teasing the third episode of Denis Leary’s “Sex&Drugs&Rock&Roll” sitcom, airing July 30, 2015, on the FX television network.

]]>http://www.slicingupeyeballs.com/2015/07/25/sex-drugs-rock-roll-slicing-up-eyeballs/feed/0http://www.slicingupeyeballs.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/07/sex-160x120.jpghttp://www.slicingupeyeballs.com/2015/07/25/sex-drugs-rock-roll-slicing-up-eyeballs/Slicing Up Eyeballs, 2009-2015: It’s the end of the world as we know it (and I feel fine)http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/SlicingUpEyeballs/~3/AcU4J8SBzDg/
http://www.slicingupeyeballs.com/2015/05/03/goodbye-farewell-amen/#commentsMon, 04 May 2015 00:08:44 +0000http://www.slicingupeyeballs.com/?p=56965

The cassettes used in the original header/logo design, as they’ve sat since the site launched.

[tweetmeme]On Feb. 20, 2009, Slicing Up Eyeballs launched onto the web not with a bang but a whimper, debuting with a simple 91-word declaration and a headline cribbed from an R.E.M. song that Google Analytics now tells me was not viewed by a single person that day (which seems a bit off, since I’m fairly certain I looked at it at least once myself).

The following day, thanks to posts about Sonic Youth, The Godfathers, Depeche Mode and The Replacements, the site claimed a whopping 12 unique pageviews. And we were off.

In the intervening six years, this site has become more than I ever expected, a news source devoted to following and celebrating the ’80s college rock and alternative bands that so many of us still cherish, attracting an audience that I still have trouble grasping — accumulating, over that time, 13 million pageviews from 4.3 million different people in 228 countries around the planet.

This is Slicing Up Eyeballs’ 4,587th post. It’s also the last.

I’ve spent months laboring over this decision; in fact, this very post was created, according to WordPress, on Nov. 9 of last year. I revisited it a few times, but kept talking myself out of pulling the plug, most notably in December, when I decided to redouble my efforts to keep this site going.

But I was just delaying the inevitable. Over the past year, I both found less and less time to devote to this — as regular visitors no doubt will have noticed through the fall-off, first gradual then precipitous, in posting frequency — and have grappled with growing burnout.

Maintaining a music-news site, even a niche one like this, means putting in an inordinate amount of time on the Internet hamster wheel, either feeding the beast with new news that often will be straight-up copied-and-pasted or, at best, lightly regurgitated by other sites (with a link-back if you’re lucky), or churning out the very same album/tour/reunion news that so many other sites already have or will.

Certainly, there’s room for originality and creativity, and I took great pleasure when there was news to share about lesser-known acts like Game Theory, Eleventh Dream Day, Orange Juice or Redd Kross. But it was also clear that people were far more interested in — or, rather, far more people were interested in — reading about The Smiths, New Order, The Cure, Siouxsie and the Banshees, Depeche Mode, et al.

None of this is particularly good nor bad; it’s simply how these things work, and, after six-plus years, it’s time to get off the aforementioned hamster wheel. This site started, quite deliberately, as a one-person operation, and despite many generous offers to help from other writers over the years, and even bids to purchase the site in part or outright, it’s going to end that way.

But the important thing here — the most important thing — is that I stop to thank you, the readers of Slicing Up Eyeballs. I started this site because I figured that if I still liked this music, there probably were others out there, too, who would enjoy reading about these bands. I never imagined there would be so many of you. So thank you for reading, for sharing, for listening, for participating — for everything.

You’re the only reason this site lasted as long as it did. Because people cared.

With that in mind, because there is a community out there, I am going to maintain the Slicing Up Eyeballs presence on Facebook and Twitter. While I won’t be posting here any longer, there is still so much out there to share, celebrate and comment on via social media, where so many of you already are.

And, of course, as we’ve all seen so many times, few break-ups are forever anymore. So I will rule nothing out for the future of Slicing Up Eyeballs — certainly an onstage reunion by Messrs. Morrissey and Marr would obligate me to fire this rickety old beast back up again. Until then, my friends.

[tweetmeme]Tonight’s edition of “Dark Wave”— the Sunday night celebration of the “darker side of classic alternative” on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave— featured music by The Sisters of Mercy, This Mortal Coil, Dif Juz, Revolting Cocks, Shriekback, Nash the Slash, Sex Gang Children, The Sound, Siouxsie and the Banshees, PiL, Coil and more.

“Dark Wave,” hosted by Slicing Up Eyeballs founder/editor Matt Sebastian, airs every Sunday from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. Eastern on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave (Channel 33). The most recent two episodes also are available as part of Sirius XM’s new On Demand service for online subscribers.

The Jesus and Mary Chain, “Cherry Came Too”Throwing Muses, “Saving Grace”That Petrol Emotion, “It’s a Good Thing”Love and Rockets, “Waiting for the Flood”Leonard Cohen, “Everybody Knows”Dif Juz, “No Motion”Echo and the Bunnymen, “With a Hip”Coil, “The Snow (Answers Come in Dreams II)”Depeche Mode, “To Have and To Hold”Public Image Ltd., “The Order of Death”Revolting Cocks, “Crackin’ Up”Ministry, “Revenge”Nash the Slash, “Swing-Shift”Siouxsie and the Banshees, “Song From the Edge of the World”Flesh For Lulu, “Cat Burglar”

[tweetmeme]The Dead Milkmen are offering fans a look inside the recording of their new song “Prisoner’s Cinema” via Weathervane Music’s “Shaking Through” series of short documentaries, which are designed to illuminate the “vision and process of recording music.” Plus, they’re offering a free download, via Bandcamp, of the finished product.

The film captures the Milkmen working with producer Brian McTear and engineer/mixer Matt Schimelfenig at Philadelphia’s Miner Street Recordings, and includes interviews about their process and career, including the pressures they felt after scoring an unlikely hit in 1988 with “Punk Rock Girl.”

In the film, Rodney Anonymous says of recording:

“In the long run I don’t care how it sounds, lets just go and have fun and enjoy ourselves… if it doesn’t sound right you just don’t release it….if you don’t enjoy yourself when you’re doing it that comes through…I have yet to meet anybody that had a really bad time in the studio and made a really good record.”

[tweetmeme]Tonight’s edition of “Dark Wave”— the Sunday night celebration of the “darker side of classic alternative” on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave— featured music by The Cure, John Foxx, Death Cult, Tones on Tail, Front 242, Oppenheimer Analysis, Virgin Prunes, Front Line Assembly, English Boy on the Loveranch, Red Lorry Yellow Lorry and more.

“Dark Wave,” hosted by Slicing Up Eyeballs founder/editor Matt Sebastian, airs every Sunday from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. Eastern on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave (Channel 33). The most recent two episodes also are available as part of Sirius XM’s new On Demand service for online subscribers.

[tweetmeme]To coincide with our just-posted Top 100 songs of 1981 readers poll results, we’ve created this accompanying Spotify playlist. As you can see (and hear), the playlist is bookended by Depeche Mode, with “Just Can’t Get Enough” at No. 1 and “Photographic” at No. 100, and 97 songs in between. What’s missing? Joan Jett’s “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll,” which isn’t on Spotify.

[tweetmeme]Pardon our (more than) slight delay, but we’re back, after copious number-crunching, with the second installment in our new Best of the ’80s Redux series, the Slicing Up Eyeballs readers poll that has now determined our collective ranking of the Top 100 songs of 1981.

Following our Best of the ’80s album polls in 2013, we decided to change formats for this year’s song polls, so, instead of giving you a pre-selected menu of tracks to choose from, we’re going with pure open, anything-goes voting. And for the ’81 poll, we upped the ballot from 10 to 25 slots.

For this 1981 poll, there were 9,082 total votes cast, which was only a slight increase over the 1980 results, despite each participant being able to vote for significantly more songs.

So far fewer people voted this time around.

As you can see below, Depeche Mode’s “Just Can’t Get Enough” took the No. 1 spot, followed closely by Soft Cell’s “Tainted Love” at No. 2 and The Human League’s “Don’t You Want Me” at No. 3.

There is still some confusion over the rules, with people voting for songs that were singles in 1981, yet already had been released on albums in 1980. Songs that made the Top 100 of 1980, such as The Clash’s “The Magnificent Seven” or Blondie’s “Rapture,” garnered a lot of votes this time around, as well.

So thank you all for voting and sharing your thoughts. Take a look at the Top 100 list below — and feel free to offer your own take on the results, good or bad, in the comments below.

[tweetmeme]Tonight’s edition of “Dark Wave”— the Sunday night celebration of the “darker side of classic alternative” on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave— featured music by The Cult, Rose of Avalanche, Soft Cell, New Model Army, Front 242, Kissing the Pink, Comsat Angels, The Bolshoi, Chris Connelly, Section 25, Julian Cope, Ministry and more.

“Dark Wave,” hosted by Slicing Up Eyeballs founder/editor Matt Sebastian, airs every Sunday from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. Eastern on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave (Channel 33). The most recent two episodes also are available as part of Sirius XM’s new On Demand service for online subscribers.

The footage — uploaded and sent to us this weekend by frequent “120 Minutes” Rewind contributor mrbriefcasetv2 — is from the April 27, 1986, broadcast, which the ever-handy 120 Minutes Archive lists as its earliest-known episode. The show debuted on March 10, 1986, so this would be, by our count, the eighth episode ever aired, although the 120 Minutes Archive suggests it’s only the fourth.

As you can see from the video posted below, the 35-minute reel spans the entire two-hour show, with many, but not all, of the music videos cut out. Still included: videos from Latin Quarter, The Untouchables, Cactus World News, The Go-Betweens, Roaring Boys and Laurie Anderson.

What you get is a lot of J.J. Jackson — one of several rotating hosts used until “120 Minutes” creator Dave Kendall took over in 1989 — plus music news (including the announcement of Andy Rourke’s short-lived departure from The Smiths) and “120 X-Ray” segments on both The Untouchables and Laurie Anderson (“Is Laurie Anderson a genius or simply just a weirdo? The ‘120 X-Ray’ reveals all,” Jackson promises).

There are also some great commercials, including a Max Headroom ad for Coke and a pitch for Judas Priest’s new record (“It’s 1986, do you know where your children are?” Rob Halford asks). Oh, and a promo for an upcoming guest VJ slot by “Cosby kids” Malcolm Jamal-Warner and Tempestt Bledsoe.

[tweetmeme]Tonight’s edition of “Dark Wave”— the Sunday night celebration of the “darker side of classic alternative” on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave— featured music by Bauhaus, Skinny Puppy, The Naked and the Dead, Lard, Camouflage, The Lucy Show, Danielle Dax, Death in June, The Essence, Xmal Deutschland, Alien Sex Fiend, Skeletal Family and more.

“Dark Wave,” hosted by Slicing Up Eyeballs founder/editor Matt Sebastian, airs every Sunday from 10 p.m. to 1 a.m. Eastern on Sirius XM’s 1st Wave (Channel 33). The most recent two episodes also are available as part of Sirius XM’s new On Demand service for online subscribers.